A week of Miracles and HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE BEST SISTER IN THE WORLD!!!

Goedemorgen Familie een Vriendin!!

 

Holy cow this has been the craziest week!! I feel like I have so much to say and tell all of you! I am literally going to just number things and explain each of them. I have seen so many great miracles happen!

 

1. I dyed my hair last Pday. I will send pictures next week. It was driving me crazy and it was such a terrible color so I decided to dye it at this random place in Gent. I spent WAY too much money and I have no idea what I will be doing after this because of that.

2. One of my companions Zuster Morris was emergency transferred this past week to Den Bosche in the Netherlands. We found out Tuesday and she left this past Thursday and it was SO sad! I had started to get close with her and then all of a sudden she is gone. So now it is just me and Zuster Djoukeng. It is so weird and so great all at the same time!

3. We find out transfers this next Sunday so next week I will know if I am staying in Gent or if I am transferred to somewhere else. I better be staying in Gent because I love it here SOO much.

4. We now have SIX progressing investigators!! We have two of them with a baptismal date and we possibly could have three by next week which means we will see lots of baptisms in September and the beginning of October.  Anna, one of our investigators, has gone through all of the lessons and we were debating on what to teach her this past week. We couldnt figure it out but something has been keeping her from coming to church and wanting to be baptized. Both me and my companion agreed that something would have to change, or we would have to see her kind of move forward, or else we would have to figure something out since we have been teaching her for quite awhile. We decided to show her the restoration DVD since it has been so long since we taught her the first lesson. We watched it, and the spirit was so strong. As the movie got over, we started talking about how she has really developed a relationship with god and how far she has come in just a short amount of time. All of a sudden she says "I have something I want to tell you" she proceeds to tell us this story of how one of her cats got really sick this past couple of weeks (she has like 5 cats and they are very dear to her heart btw) she said she prayed to heavenly father that if her cat could get better and live, she would promise to be baptized. And guess what happened? her cat is completely better, even though all of the vets told her it was going to die so Anna is going to be baptized!! She said that is the sign that he really does love me. It was probably the most spiritual experience I have had on my mission thus far. We were all crying and we all had the chills! It was such an amazing miracle! Literally, the lord is just handing us people to teach. It isnt missionary work right now, it is just missionary fun I decided.

I also taught ALL by myself to our investigator Kathy this past week, who is getting baptized on September 21st :) It was such a cool experience and its amazing how much I just love these people and I really hardly know them.  

5. The other day we were walking in Oudenarde which is like 45 minutes outside of gent to a members house and somehow, me just being me, I slipped and fell and wacked my head on the side of the road. It is a HUGE gooseache and all purple and red. We were a little worried I had a small concussion because I had a headache basically the whole rest of the day, but no worries I am okay now. It is healing up really well. I just had to tell you because It just made me laugh that only me would find a way to do that. haha

Other than that, this is the best job anyone could ever have!! Even though some days seem like they would never end and I miss all of you, when you have the experience of watching this gospel change someones life and you can see it in there eyes and they want to change, it makes every single second worth it!! We meet and talk with people every single day and we are just sooo busy teaching like crazy, especially this week. I love this gospel and I know it is true. I would not be out here doing this every single day if I didnt! I love my mission and I love all of you so much. Thanks for all of your support and love. You are the best! Until next week,

 

Ik houd van jullie een a goede week hebben!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

This is me and my companions in Brussels w/ our waffles that have nutella, bananas, and whipped cream :)

Me and my MTC roommates/companions in Brussels

This is a castle in Gent we went to last week called Gravensteen. I am at the top w/ the view in the background

I love Belgium!!

Hello Everyone!!

 

This week has been a great one. We have been SOOO busy with everything. I seriously cant believe how many miracles I see every single day! We met this great lady named Kathy, who is actually Fillipino and is here for school. Gent is absolutely full of students because I have heard that it is alot cheaper and who wouldnt want to live in Gent, Belgium anyways? But we contacted her through a referral through a member and we set a baptismal date for September 7th!! :) We were all soo happy! She is just fantastic. We also found another family that is now one of our progressing investigators. This next week, we are going to be sooo busy. There are a couple days that I will be extremely surprised if we will get through because we have so many appointments and things to do. Which is great! The work is moving forward and extremely fast!

 

We had to go to Brussels again this past wednesday for my legality. And congratulations to me, I am now an offical resident of Beligum :) I just am waiting for my identity card to come in the mail! I got to see all of my MTC district again and it was soooo great to see them. Me and Zuster Thorley freaked out when we saw each other. This wednesday we are going into Antwerpen for zone training and I am super excited for that because they are always great and our zone leaders are amaaaazing. The weather here has finally started to cool down a little bit. It rains almost every day as expected and I absolutley love it!

 

So this is really random but they have these cookies here called Speculos and I am basically addicted. The only thing I can think of that it is somewhat similar to is Biscoff in the States. But even then it is SO much better. Other than that, nothing is new here just working really hard! I love everyone I am serving with and I am so glad to be out here right now. The church is true and I see miracles every single day! I love you and miss you all so much!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

Goedemiddag from the mooi staat of Ghent!

Hello Friends and Family!!

 

This week was such a crazy one and it went by so so fast! Im tellin ya...the days sometimes feel like they will never end and then all of a sudden the week is over and we are doing weekly planning again. Super crazy! Our investigators are still progressing. We had our first baptism in over a year here in Ghent!! His name is Reggie and the Elder Alston and Elder Suckow taught him. He is seriously so strong and ready to be apart of this church. Broeder Geens (our ward mission leader) told us yesterday that his first calling would most likely be a ward missionary because of how ready he is to preach the gospel. Our investigator, Patrick, came to the baptism and he said he really felt the spririt and I seriously want him to be baptized SOOO bad. Just because he is such a great guy and he has such a great spririt about him. He was the one that speaks french, which I can understand alot of what he says which is super weird because I feel like ever since ive learned dutch and flemish, my french has gone out the window. But its been fun to have that in the background a little bit.

 

We got to go to Brussels this past wedensday for my companions legality issues. And I will be going again this wednesday as well for my legality forms. Oh my goodness it is such an amazing city! Of course it was raining all day long (as it does almost every morning here) but I am learning to love it. We got a Belgium waffle in the train station, because we have heard that the waffles in Brussels have a special taste to them I guess. I about dyed because it was SOO good. They make them and put some sort of sugary syrup over them so It was delicious :) I wish I could send some home to you all without them getting all mushed!

 

This past week we visited almost 14 less-active members. Which is ALOT. We went on splits for two of the days with two members here so that is how we got alot done. President Van Hees (our branch president) is having us focus alot on rebuilding their ward here so we are very busy doing that. Me and Zuster Morris visited this less active named Laura Rodas. She let us in her house and she was thee sweestest lady EVER. She explained to us that her husband had left her and she had one little boy who was 11 and she had joined some other church in the meantime. She said she had a leak in her roof and it had basically destroyed her walls and floors in her upper floor. So we offered to help and at first she was very againist it saying "no no you have plenty of other things to do" (Belgians are very like that, they dont like to impose on anything or anybody else) but we kept insisting we could help until she finally said yes. Before we left she told us that right before we rang her doorbell she had been praying for someone to come into her life that could help her with it. Such an amazing miracle!!! So we are going back this thursday with our elders to help repaint and rebuild her house! I am so excited!

 

Other that that we are just having a blast!! I love everything about Belgium and the Flemish language. I am starting to get it down more and more and I am understanding alot now. I love missionary work and I love this mission! The church is true. Every single time I am feeling down and just basically want to crawl in my bed I see a miracle like that happen and I am good. haha We have lots of appointments with potential investigators this week as well so I am excited! I love and miss you all more than I can say!! You are all the best friends and family anyone could ask for!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

 

Ik houd van Jullie!

Another Week down!!!

Hello Friends and Family!!

So fair warning this is a european keyboard so this may not be that long because I am typing like a snail. haha But we have had an amazing week here in Gent! I obviously LOVE Belgium sooo much!! The members here are seriously sooo great. We are fed every single night for the most part which means I am going to seriously to gain weight if I am not careful! haha I had my first Belgium waffle the other day and it was to die for!!! you guys are all missing out. along with the frites and the pastries :) sooo yummy! We also had some record breaking temperatures in Belgium this past week too. It was about 92 degrees farenheit zith 94percent humidity. We were seriously DYING.

The flemish is coming along really great actually. I am scared to go back to Holland and only hear dutch because now I am used to it and the softness of the language. we went on exchanges this past week so i was able to go to Antwerpen for an overnighter since we had zone training and it was sooo much fun!! funny story...so the sisters apartment that we stayed at gets super hot at night so we had to sleep with the windows open which just means more bugs. they dont believe in air conditioning too (god bless america) so that made it even better. i woke up the next morning and i literally had a bottem lip the size of asia!! it was like that scene off of hitch or something. haha i still cant figure out what bit me but it took like allll day for the swelling to go down.

we had a really cool experience while we were in Antwerpen as well. we met this young adult named jason and we went and started talking to him about the gospel; he had said he had been praying for someone to come intp his life that could tell him how to be happier (ding ding we have a winner haha) so of course we were excited. all of a sudden he says oh my goodness ive dreamt about you! and of course i was super shocked to hear that. i guess he had actually seen my face before in a dream. kinda cool and creepy i guess haha he is great though and we love to sit and teach him the lessons.

well i love you all sooo much and miss you every single day! i know this gospel is true because i see it change peoples lives every single day! im so glad i have the oppurtunity to be a missionary! ik houd van jullie heel veel!!!

love, zuster brophy